Page 53 of Diamond Kisses

Even Peter grunted in misery.

There was no end to this.

No one coming.

No help on the horizon.

Eventually, I wouldn’t be able to keep behaving.

Eventually, Victor would kill Ily to break me.

Eventually, we would all die anyway.

But today, she was alive.

And I had no choice.

Forgive me, little nightmare.

Don’t watch.

I beg you…don’t watch.

With hands that didn’t shake and a soul that turned into snow and sleet, I unbuttoned the trousers of the man I hated most in the world. I unzipped the monster I would one day murder. And I pulled out the erection of a dead man.

Ily’s sob echoed in my ears as I bent over his lap—

“Behave, Henri…” Victor purred. “My one and only warning.”

I pictured Ily being hurt because of me.

I pictured her beautiful breasts hacked off her gorgeous body and slapped onto a plate because of me.

I pictured her dying because of me.

And I shut down the final pieces, the true pieces, the last good and true pieces…

…and kissed him.

Chapter Eight

………………………….

Q

“EH, MAÎTRE?”

I stiffened as I stepped over the threshold of my home. “What is it, Suzette?” Wiping my hands with the damp towel Franco had given me to clean up with, I hoped she wouldn’t notice the pink bloodstains.

Not my blood.

Blood of the men who’d tried to take my son.

Three men were left. Imprisoned in the abattoir at the back of my estate for the past few weeks, slowly giving me information.

That didn’t include the eleven men I’d already dispatched.

They were rotting in a canal somewhere.

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